


A Nohrian Grave in Hoshido

by JulyStorms



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-02
Updated: 2016-04-02
Packaged: 2018-05-30 20:31:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6439423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JulyStorms/pseuds/JulyStorms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryoma takes his time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Nohrian Grave in Hoshido

**Author's Note:**

> This story assumes the _Revelation_ plotline. I took the liberty of pulling information from F!Corrin’s supports with Scarlet and applying them to Ryoma’s knowledge of her. It also references in part Scarlet’s festival conversation with Ryoma, which you can read [here](http://pastebin.com/BEAfB5Qz).
> 
> Further notes are at my Tumblr and should be read after the story: here.

Scarlet was exactly where Ryoma had left her. She was on her back, one knee slightly bent, and from a distance it almost looked as if she were merely resting in the grass. It wasn’t until he was close enough to make out the freckles on her face that he could see the dried blood casting a dull sheen on her otherwise-bright armor. She stared unblinkingly at the open sky.

It wouldn’t make sense to take her back with him, yet Ryoma wanted to do that very thing. He wasn’t entirely sure why. It was impractical, more than a little grotesque, and they were in a hurry; nobody had time to deal with a corpse, least of all him.

Common sense said to leave her behind to rot with the rest.

It wasn’t as if the shell housed the woman, anyway.

But the idea of leaving her burned uncomfortably, a niggling itch in his chest.

It probably made him weak, as so much seemed to these days. He swallowed hard, remembering a thousand little things about her at once, like the way she laughed when she thought something was only mildly amusing or the tilt of her head when she wanted a concept explained in more detail.

He kneeled beside her, fingers sliding to the base of her throat to press carefully against her pulse point. It was silly to do it, knowing she was dead and hoping for anything else. It was sillier still to feel disappointed in the stillness of her skin beneath his fingertips.

He’d done this very thing not so long ago, though his ear had been against Scarlet’s mouth, then, waiting for a sign of life, any proof at all that Corrin had been mistaken in thinking she was dead. But she had been too still and too silent, so incredibly unlike her, and so he had known even before touching her that she was gone. But Ryoma was not the sort of man who could function on instinct and assumption alone; he required the certainty that checking afforded him, and the answer, while not what he wanted, was the grim reality he was forced to accept.

She was most certainly dead, body remarkably unharmed though part of her hair ribbon had been singed and the flower that Corrin told him about with a shaking voice, the one Ryoma hadn’t seen himself but was certainly meant to, had burned away entirely.

His reaction, then, had been to pull Scarlet’s body close to him in something that wasn’t quite an embrace, wasn’t quite anything but a mix of shock and stark grief. He hadn’t known what else to do—how else to act. It wasn’t until later that he realized it had been too large a display for feelings he could not put into words.

He still did not fully understand everything he felt; no amount of meditation could bring balance to the reality he had experienced only hours earlier: Scarlet, who had been dead the last time he had seen her, had returned. It seemed little more than a sick joke, an illusion meant to cause particular torment, but her presence was her own—so incredibly familiar that he’d known it immediately.

And in her animated state she had come straight to him.

Though it only lasted a moment, the hope that surged through his veins at the sight of her still sickened him. To hesitate, to let his own feelings get in the way of doing what was best for her—he was a weak and foolish man. Scarlet wasn’t entirely gone, but what remained of her spirit was trapped there, not simply lingering. It was for that reason alone that he managed to find the strength to take her life. It needed to be done but he doubted he would ever feel anything but sick over it. She had come to him and all he had been able to do was kill her.

Grief still weighed heavily in his chest, but now there was guilt, too, for not being able to do more, and remorse, and a dozen other emotions. At the very least the woman who had earned his affection deserved a respectful burial but there was no time for that. There wasn’t enough time for anything decent.

He would either have to bring her along and wait until time could be made, or he would have to leave her body where it was. He considered his options, practicality at war with his stormy and conflicting emotions.

Returning to camp with her in his arms would raise a lot of questions and Hoshido’s future king could not afford to look unhinged. Besides, he reminded himself, they were at war; weeks or even months could pass before there was time to give her a proper sendoff.

He breathed out a sigh. In the grand scheme of things, something so small did not matter. The desire to see her buried was a selfish one—for his sake more than hers. The realization made it easier to tuck away his personal feelings and decide to do the practical thing. Scarlet would understand, as she so often did; she would probably laugh to know the decision weighed so heavily on his heart. She was a star in the sky, now, not a part of her earthly body. Why did he care so much about a triviality?

Because he loved her, maybe. Because he was only human. His mind said that her body and her soul were not the same, but his heart did not yet understand it.

In a fit of sentimentality that was almost embarrassingly childish, Ryoma leaned over her body to snap off a dandelion; it seemed unaffected by the day’s battle, bright and cheerful despite the horror that had taken place. Or maybe it was only cursed to look unfailingly pleasant despite its circumstances. They were common in Nohr, he knew, and therefore not at all fitting for Scarlet, but he thought there was something admirable about a flower that dotted the fields every spring and early summer no matter how poor the quality of soil given them. If only he were half that strong, maybe some things would have turned out differently—better.

The ribbon she always wore was crooked and loose, so he did his best to tie it again and tucked the flower into her hair, hiding the stem behind her ear.

“I’m sorry,” he said, curling his fingers into a fist to keep them from trembling. “I don’t know what it means.”

Not that it mattered, anyway; no one flower could mirror so many different emotions.

Out of words and time, Ryoma got to his feet. The others would wonder where he had gotten to and he couldn’t have them knowing he was out on the battlefield checking to make sure Scarlet really was dead.

He looked down at her—a final glance—but everything about her seemed wrong. It twisted his insides.

He couldn’t leave without saying something, but in trying to tell her goodbye, his voice turned suddenly brittle. The syllables were heavy for such a little word. He bit the edge of his tongue hard until he felt his composure return.

“Goodbye, Scarlet,” he said again, and though his tone softened too much on the edge of her name, he was relieved to hear it come out evenly: the voice of a high prince and not that of a quietly grieving man.

* * *

 

The grave, when he cleared a space for it, was simple. Scarlet had always liked decorative things, but she had spoken often of traditions from Cheve, and so Ryoma had opted for a compromise between their nations; the grave was Nohrian but the flowers he would use to decorate it—they would be from Hoshido.

“She deserves to be remembered,” was his reasoning for it, but he could not deny that it was almost as much for his own peace of mind.

Hinoka’s voice was gentle. “You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone,” she said, turning her head to look at him, “least of all me. I think this is nice.”

He was silent for a long time, staring down at the grass and the small, engraved headstone. “Is it too much?”

“What?”

“This.” He gestured to the gravestone.

She smiled, but there was something sad in it that he didn’t like. “You’re not like most people, you know that? I would have—you know I’d have cried my eyes out to lose someone I cared for. You lost Scarlet twice.”

There was no need for pretenses around Hinoka. Of course he had cared for Scarlet, perhaps more than he had ever let anyone know. “The second time was more difficult.”

She hugged herself. “I know. But you didn’t break down, not even once. Not really. You wanted to, though, right? I would have. I don’t think I could have helped myself.”

He couldn’t answer it definitively and so remained silent.

“It’s been a couple of months, Ryoma. I think it’s okay if you let yourself mourn, now—in whatever way helps the most.”

He was grateful for her understanding, but didn’t think he needed to say so. “I think this will help.”

Her fingers were light against his arm. “Then it’s not too much.” She was silent a moment, and then withdrew her hand. “What kind of flowers are you considering?”

“I haven’t decided.” He shifted slightly, a hand pushing back his hair. “I want them to be perfect. I’ll have to do some research.”

She nodded, but said nothing for a long moment. He decided not to, either; that they could have peaceful silences at all was a small miracle. He intended to enjoy them whenever possible.

“Did you cry?” she asked suddenly, breaking the silence.

He swallowed hard and looked over to find her staring down at the headstone he’d had made.

“What?”

“I wanna know if you ever let yourself cry over her.”

He didn’t see any point in lying. “No.”

“Why not?”

He stared at the engraving, eyes tracing the curves of words.

“It won’t change anything,” he said, only a partial truth. He hadn’t had the time to cry, not with a war staring him in the face, but even if he had been presented with a moment to himself, he would have felt guilty for prioritizing his own feelings above everyone else’s. He was a leader first and a man second, after all. He was not allowed to forget such a fundamental thing.

“It’s nice to cry sometimes. Feels good to get the emotion out.”

“But it won’t bring her back.” He hadn’t meant for the words to come out hard, but they did.

Hinoka settled her hand against his back, the touch almost motherly, and kept her words to herself, perhaps understanding that nothing she said could change the way he felt about it.

* * *

 

Ryoma’s dreams about Scarlet often focused on his memories, good and bad alike.

They shifted and changed and jumped without warning from one half-forgotten memory to another and back again so that he was pressing his lips to her cheek one moment and seeing her corpse on the ground the next only to have her laughing and clutching his arm again as if nothing at all was the matter.

While some of the better memories faded with time, Scarlet’s second death did not. It was never far from his sleeping mind, perhaps because he had been the one to cause it.

He remembered it all in vivid detail, but the worst of it was the resistance of muscle and bone as he’d wedged his crackling sword beneath her breastplate and forced it up through her gut only to have her slide down the sword, a pained, breathless, “Thank you” on her lips as she sank against him. It was not a quick death, but he held her until the end. It was hard not to think too much about it. How much pain did she feel? Had she known who he was, and if so, had it made her death better or worse?

He knew he’d never get answers to any of his questions.

It was haunting and not something he could talk about with anyone. Corrin, who had spoken with Scarlet often, felt guilty that she had died for his sake, and the others—well, Ryoma was the eldest; it was his job to bear the burdens, not to distribute them.

So he dealt with his unsettling dreams the only way he knew how, which was to rise, dress, and meditate to start his day. It wasn’t as if dwelling on it with a trembling heart would do him any good. Scarlet was dead, after all.

The only direction to go was forward.

* * *

 

Weeks passed before he found the right flower, but eventually he happened upon one that was pretty and had a suitable meaning. It wasn’t difficult to procure a handful of tiny seedlings, stems barely there, roots soft and fragile.

Ryoma had never cared much for taking care of plants, but the idea of letting someone else do the work was unacceptable, so he did it himself, digging out the grass from around the grave before planting the drooping little plants all around the base of it.

“I doubt they’ll bloom this year,” he said quietly, fingers gently packing in the soil around the roots, “but they’ll return next year, and then you’ll be able to see them.”

It was perhaps a silly and indulgent thought, but there was something peaceful about it. If Scarlet’s spirit resided in the sky as she’d often talked about, then she’d be able to look down and see that she had been remembered.

He tended the plants diligently over the next few months. If anyone thought it odd that their king would sully his hands doing basic gardening, nobody dared to say it to his face. Perhaps they understood that it was his way of mourning.

The flowers did not bloom, but the seasons continued on as usual.

There was little Ryoma could do to tend to anything when the ground froze solid, but he continued to visit. Though it was partially out of habit by then, he could admit to himself that it was nice to have a few moments alone in the morning in the fresh air. Sometimes, when the snow dusted over the top of the gravestone, he felt so incredibly at peace that he found it in himself to say a few words—nothing poetic, nothing wonderful. Just a hello, if he felt it, or a comment about his plans for the day. It wasn’t so very unusual to talk to a grave, and sometimes it was nice to imagine she could hear him, even if she had no way of responding.

When spring came, the flowers returned, sprouting a bright and lovely green against the earth. They spread out around the grave as if to claim the entire area for themselves but did not bloom. Summer rolled in hot and sticky and still the flowers waited. It wasn’t until the weather cooled again that buds began to form and twist, and early one autumn morning he arrived at Scarlet’s grave to find that one of them had finally bloomed.

He knelt beside it in the pale sunlight and brushed a fingertip over the soft, white petals, his throat feeling suddenly tight. “Anemone,” he said aloud, voice as steady as he could make it, “grows here in Hoshido. It has a great many meanings, and perhaps you know of them, but I chose it for you for my own reasons.”

He smiled slightly, eyes closing.

“After extensive research, I believe it can represent love that does not fade. Death seeks to make one feel forsaken, but it need not keep anyone from loving and being loved.”

The air was still and quiet; nothing seemed different for having said his piece.

But he had suspected as much. It was nice to say it, but it changed nothing on its own.

It would do no good to dwell on the what-ifs and might-have-beens, but Ryoma couldn’t help but wish desperately, in that moment, to know what it would be like to live with Scarlet in a quieter and more peaceful world than the one they had known together. For the first time since he had lost her, he allowed himself to slip and tried to imagine how different things would be if she were still alive. His mind could only conjure up half-images, half-thoughts: touches and kisses and interactions that did not feel whole.

Perhaps it was for the best that he couldn’t quite remember how her hand felt in his, that her laugh had largely faded from his memory. If he was able to imagine a life where her empty grave didn’t exist, it would only hurt more to open his eyes and see it in front of him.

Responsibilities crowded to the front of his mind and he pulled himself back, away from the things he would never know.

This was his reality, he reminded himself as he opened his eyes and took in the gravestone before him. There was only a single blooming flower to decorate it, but soon there would be many. The others were close, waiting patiently, not quite ready for the next step of their life, yet. They would open in their own time—and so would he, someday.

It seemed fitting, somehow, that both were easy to imagine.


End file.
